Shark and Water. [IO]

A bright sunny sky was looming above the peaceful village of Konoha, as the sun peered into the room of young Genin Byakura Hozuki as he was still asleep from the late night training with his old teammate. Tossing and turning the young boy would slowly be coming to the edge of his bed until a loud crash could be heard from downstairs. Waking up quickly he would look around and scratch his head," What the hell just happened and why am I on the floor," being oblivious as ever.

Hearing the loud thud his grandfather would walk into the room seeing him on the ground would begin to laugh," What are you doing on the ground boy, you know you are supposed to sleep in the bed. Anyways your mother is waiting for you downstairs, the food is ready," As soon as his grandfather said food he would shrug slowly and get up walking over to his closet grabbing his usual clothing: a black school jacket white bandages due to last nights training and black pants. He would not have his shoes on yet, but he would have his arms bandaged to the knuckles as he walked downstairs.

He would walk down the stairs sort of lazily until he arrived to the door a knife would go flying towards him. Moving slightly, Byakura would move out of the way as he stared at his mom," WHAT!!!! What the heck was that about mom you could have killed me," his eyes would become bigger as more knives surrounded him, making an outline of him as his mother smiled at him," You know you are not allowed to miss the time for breakfast, so that was your punishment. Next time get up earlier despite training okay Byakura?," her evil smile showing as he held up another knife.

Nodding rapidly he was moving to sit on the floor to eat,carefully eyeing his mother carefully," That demon woman will be the death of me i swear...maybe i should take her knives away from her." as almost on cue she looked at him, a devilish glint in her eyes. A chill would go up his spin as he quickly finished eating," Love you mom gotta go," quickly getting up and running out of the house with his shoes.

Once a decent ways away from the demon lady he would head to the forest where he would do some training and hopefully get some peace and quiet. Stretching his body before training, he would do fourty push-ups, sixty sit-ups, and one hundred jumping jacks. Once done he would begin to practice the small amounts of taijutsu he knew, punching at the training dummy. Occasionally he would kick at the tree, his foot reaching its head with ease. His flexibility was amazing for someone of his age, but it was simply due to all of his training with his gramps...and the slight dodging lesson from his devil mom's knives.

This would continue for a while until he jumped into one of the tree and laid in it acting as leisurely as possible. He often pondered on changing his course from a Ninjutsu based manner to Taijutsu, though his movements were still a bit sluggish compared to his friend and grandfathers, he was still pretty fast all things considered. What he needed was something to push himself further on the brink in order to find out what his true passion would be. As time slowly ebbed forward he closed his eyes and listened in on the voice of nature and the wind, taking in its familiar song until someone had came through or he had gotten tired and went back to training.

[616]

The sun was up, shining down on the already sweating shark man. Kaito was doing a run at this time. Normally he would run for a few miles, but time was not on his side today. Normally he’d be hours into his training by the time the sun came up, but today he had woke up late and decided that lowering the running would have the least detrimental impact on his training routine. He would only be running for the rest of a mile, of which he was nearly finished. Now that the sun was up there were far more people out and about, going about their daily lives and their own training.
 
The shark man would end his run where it had started in the training grounds, glancing about to see what he would do next. He would look over to the training dummies. He could practice his taijutsu there, though he would prefer to be improving his kenjutsu. He still “wasn’t ready” for his own sword according to his clan elders. It was frustrating, but he understood their reasoning on the matter. His ineptitude during his academy days only brought shame to the family and mostly to himself. He was no better than a child in their eyes, and until the village placed more stock into his capabilities as a shinobi they likely would not change their opinions on this.
 
It wouldn’t take long before Kaito saw a recognizable face here at the training dummies. The blue hair was easy enough to pick out of a crowd. It was Byakura, the genin he had completed a series of odd jobs with a few days prior. “HEY!” The large man would shout, attempting to catch the resting man’s attention before approach. He had no intention of sneaking up on someone with their eyes closed, for that was an easy way to find a kunai speeding its way towards one’s head. “Yo, I remember you. Byakura, right?” Kaito would ask, though he was sure this was the same person from the other day. “How’s the training going? You looking for a training partner? I am happy to help in any way I can.”

Nothing had came to mind when he had laid in the tree, of course he was as scatterbrained as ever when he relaxed or even in a calm nature. Byakura's body was positioned a bit oddly as his legs were dangling off of the tree and his torso was cocked to the side, if a strong breeze were to come through he probably would have fell out of the tall tree and hit his head now that would be if he had terrible balance which he didn't. Without being much of a lazy bones he began to focus a small amount of chakra into his palms, making small a small ripple of water within his hand, probably half the size of his palm at best. It was merely a simple experiment with his water based chakra to see how much he could manipulate it.

The animals and the trees began to sing their little happy songs, although not in a literal sense considering trees could not sing but in a metaphorical sense. The wind blew through the trees gracefully and slowly as he smiled and continued to nod his head to the music of nature. The simple song of nature took him off his concentration causing the water that had been swirling in his hand to spurt and splash him in the face. Of course the act caused a mild case of chuckling as he leaned back against the tree and closed his eyes once more.

Some time had passed since that moment, the singing slowly dying down to a small point. Everything was now calm and peaceful from where he was sitting, a little hummingbird came over to greet him as it landed on his shoulder and sat there for a moment. It was like he had an affinity or natural reaction with nature that made every animal of the wild trust him, although their were some that had made him fight for that trust which wasn't that big of a deal. The hummingbird sat on his shoulder for what seemed like an eternity until he flew off in a rush, which was odd for a bird with nothing to do.

As the bird flew away however he heard a familiar voice which caused him to open his eyes once more to see who it had been to call out to him. A very familiar and stout figure that he had recognized all too well. Kaito. One of the shinobi he had been doing a large spree of missions with. Hearing his question, the male stood up and slid down out of the tree landing in front of it and smiling," Yep it is. As for my training its going well I guess you could say. I'm always looking for someone to help in my endeavors when it comes to training. What have you been up to lately?," the question was rather odd considering he was about to train with the other male. Then again he was more interested in the growth of himself and others. How would he grow if he only focused on his own goal after all?

[521]

Kaito would watch as the blue haired male slid down the tree and landed perfectly on their feet. Byakura would state that their training was going well, something that Kaito would be glad about. “My training is going well enough. To be honest it has been a tad light today so far since I…” He would scratch his head, a tad embarrassed to tell another person of his shortcomings, “I woke up a bit late today and missed out on a bunch of conditioning. Other than training though?” The shark man would look down, hand on his chin as he pondered for a moment. “Other than training I haven’t been up to a whole lot. Trying to prepare for these Chuunin Exams coming up here soon. Did you sign up?” Kaito would ask, wondering if the exams were as important to the man standing across from him as they were to the shark man.
 
Kaito would stretch some, getting ready to practice his taijutsu on the training dummies. If the blue haired male would partake, they might also be able to get in some light sparring to work up a sweat. It was far better to practice with a partner than to just train with the dummy by yourself. “So I don’t really know you. What areas do you specialize in?” The inquisitive shark would ask before realizing his rudeness of not offering his own specialties first before asking. “I’m training to be a weapon expert, but until I prove I am ready to wield a sword of my own I am sort of just a generalist. Hopefully soon I can show my clan that I am worthy of my own blade.”
 
Of course, while he was discussing with Byakura the large man would waste no time. He would be doing squats, listening intently for any response from his newfound training partner.

Byakura listened intently to the shark males words, taking each in with intrigue and interest before responding. He knew the feeling of waking up too late for his conditioning and training, but the recent talks of the Chuunin Exams made the male scratch his head quizzically," I signed up for it yes, but honestly I don't know how good i'll do. Still need a lot of training to catch up to my friends and a few others. But I have no doubts once I finish preparing for it I shall have no issues holding my own against the Genin of our village. How do you think you are going to do? Obviously we know nothing of the genin that might be participating beside the two of us, but do you think you might have a good chance?," it felt as if he was simply squawking on and on, but his words did have some merit to them. What he thought of the current competition, even if he knew nothing of them, only showed he was somewhat confident in his own ability even if he didn't show it outwardly.

Regarding the other males question there was a small smile that began to form on his face," Well right now I am focusing more on my Water based ninjutsu, but I do intend to take on a more close combat stance as well. Maybe weaponry like yourself might be in my future depending on how this chuunin exam goes. Do you by any chance know any water based ninjutsu? Or ninjutsu in general you want to share? I don't know too many, but the ones I do know i can show you as we train," of course he has noticed the male doing his squats, so his first action is to watch the male intently. One can learn many things just by observing and maybe Kaito had a routine that would help our Hozuki friend here.

[324]

Midthread Claim: 7 stats, 1000 words for http://naruto-role-play-rpg.forumotion.com/t36477-soul-expulsion?highlight=soul+expulsion C rank, 461 words toward http://naruto-role-play-rpg.forumotion.com/t22702-rain-tiger-at-will-technique making new total (2352/2500)

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